Luis Cessa leaves Monday's game with right rhomboid issue, will have MRI on Tuesday

Luis Cessa left Monday night's game against the Mets in the fifth inning after a pair of visits from the team's medical staff.(AP)

NEW YORK - New York Yankees starter Luis Cessa left Monday night's game against the Mets in the fifth inning after a pair of visits from the team's medical staff, and he will undergo an MRI on Tuesday to determine the severity of what the Yankees believe is a right rhomboid issue.

"It's closer to my neck, and not in my shoulder or elbow, thank God," Cessa said through translator Marlon Abreu after the game, "but I don't think it's something big, I think it's just something minor."

Cessa allowed two runs on five hits over 4 1/3 innings Monday night, and although he admitted that he had felt some discomfort throughout the game, he did not show it until that fifth inning; he got Mets catcher Rene Rivera to ground out to start the fifth, but on the next pitch, the righty appeared to not fully finish his first offering to Juan Lagares, prompting manager Joe Girardi and a team trainer to come out to the mound for a consultation.

"I felt it throughout the game, but at the time it wasn't something that could prevent me from pitching at all," Cessa said. "But then once I hit the fifth inning, that's when it started to get a little worse."

Cessa threw a warm-up pitch and stayed in the game, but his next offering would be his last; Lagares singled up the middle on the next pitch, and at that point, Girardi and the trainer once again came to the mound and removed Cessa in favor of Chad Green.

"I thought I could keep pitching, but Joe came out and told me he was taking me out, because he didn't want me to do something mechanically that would hurt it more," Cessa said.

Girardi also said after the game that he didn't think the issue was serious, but that the team would check it out and get an MRI done as a precaution.

Any loss of Cessa would be a blow to the Yankees, who have already lost two starters, CC Sabathia and Masahiro Tanaka, to the 10-day disabled list over the last week, and survived a scare after Jordan Montgomery was hit in the head by a line drive during batting practice on Saturday.